


It's Not Easy Being Joined

by hibernate



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Complicated Relationships, F/F, Zhian'tara
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-07
Updated: 2014-09-07
Packaged: 2018-02-16 11:44:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2268465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hibernate/pseuds/hibernate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The zhian'tara might be a good opportunity for Ezri to work out some of her Dax issues, or maybe acquire a few new ones.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Using all her expertise as a counselor, Starfleet officer, and nine-times joined Trill, Ezri writes a long and meticulously worded report to the Symbiosis Commission, detailing the situation in a manner that is -- if she does say so herself -- impossible to refute. She may not be as clever as Jadzia, Tobin or Lela, but nobody grows up a Tigan without learning some craftiness along the way.

The reply from Trill is as swift as it is short: request to delay zhian'tara denied.

Throwing the PADD across the room, Ezri wonders if they even read her report _at all_.

The official decision is sent along with a document detailing updated guidelines for the ceremony, with paragraph 147, subsection 4b highlighted on the screen. Non-Trill individuals are not recommended for the ritual, according to the highlighted text, which goes on specifying that all non-Trill species must be verified by Symbiosis Commission before chosen to participate. _Warning_ , the next section reads, _no Changeling life-forms will be currently considered for the zhian'tara, due to the unpredictability of results_.

Odo would probably have been amused at that.

A third document contains permission for Dax's zhian'tara to take place on DS9, and the stardate for when the appointed Guardian is set to arrive. For a brief moment, Ezri contemplates taking time off and being on the other side of the quadrant that particular stardate, but she has a sinking suspicion the Symbiosis Commission would manage to track her down wherever she went.

She goes through the process of making decisions and asking her friends one after the other in a daze. 

It's much too soon, she thinks, and is immediately bombarded with seven memories of previous Daxes going through the same thing. Lela was lucky, being the first, with no one but herself and Dax in her head. Meanwhile, Ezri is pretty sure most of the time that her head just isn't big enough for nine people and a symbiont. She still has a holopicture of herself with her name in big letters attached to the wall by the foot of her bed, because waking up confused about whether you're a hot-shot pilot man-child or a mother of two got really tiring after awhile.

(Not that it always helps; a few times she's woken up thinking she's still Torias and gotten half-way through a fantasy about that hot, vaguely familiar, Trill girl in the picture before suddenly remembering and having to go scrub Torias away with a high-pitched sonic shower.)

 

*

 

Being on Deep Space Nine feels, more often than not, like walking around in someone else's (much taller) shoes, and sometimes Ezri wonders whether staying was the bravest decision of her life, or the stupidest. Maybe other Trills, ones with more training, who didn't get thrown into a joining with no time to prepare, don't struggle with this, but being on the station, Ezri finds it impossible to keep from getting entangled in emotions that aren't her own. Talking to Jadzia face to face might be a good start to getting all of that sorted out, which doesn't mean she's particularly eager to do it.

She asks Kira to lunch and spends the entire forty minutes talking her ear off about the reproductive cycle of a type of Trill snail that absolutely decimated Audrid's garden three years in a row.

She asks Kira to dinner only to end up doing a nervous monologue about shoes.

She asks Kira to join her for a game of springball, and while unable to stop talking about the last holosimulation Julian had convinced her to try out, she trips over her feet and whacks herself in the face with her own racket.

While Kira conjures up some holographic ice and a tissue, Ezri sits on the floor, keenly aware of the three hundred years of Dax hosts judging her from inside her head.

"I'm sorry, I'm usually better than this," Ezri says, holding the tissue to her nose and ignoring the somewhat skeptical look Kira gives her. Sure, Kira pretty much always wins by seven hundred million points or so when they play, but Ezri does usually manage to avoid bleeding all over the court.

Kira gently presses the ice-pack to Ezri's eye. "I think you're going to need a trip to the infirmary," she says.

Leaning over her, Kira's hair falls forward -- longer on the left, braid nestled behind her ear -- and something inside Ezri that's not her at all jolts at the unfamiliarity of it. "Will you be a part of my zhian'tara?" she blurts out, before she has the time to second-guess herself.

She does regret the words when they're out, though, because Kira goes very still. She should have found someone else, someone of her friends who'd never met Jadzia at all -- someone who doesn't sometimes look at Ezri as if she's someone else entirely.

(If only there was such a person.)

"The Guardian is coming here tomorrow," she says, and feels like the biggest idiot in the quadrant. "I was going to ask you earlier."

"You want me to be host to Jadzia," Kira says, a statement and not a question.

Ezri can't bring herself to do more than nod.

 

*

 

In the infirmary, Julian puts on his doctor face and makes a great speech about the importance of helmets and safety gear while engaging in athletics. Sitting on a biobed, legs dangling, Ezri elects not to tell him that the injury occurred before any actual athletics had had a chance to take place.

Her cheek aches when she talks, anyway, so she settles into a somewhat sullen silence, while Julian runs a dermal regenerator over her face. It's not really the bruise that hurts the worst, though. It's not even her pride, which has gotten used to being battered on a daily basis. 

"Your springball opponent seemed to be in a hurry," says Julian, who at some point had finished his monologue about safety practices without Ezri noticing.

Ezri blinks against him. "Huh?"

"Colonel Kira," Julian clarifies, frowning as he looks at her eye. "She left in a hurry. You might have a concussion."

"My brain is fine," Ezri says. "I'm just... distracted."

"Oh." Julian gives her a look that's probably meant to be sympathetic, but comes off looking more like pity. "I see."

Sometimes that super-brain of his makes him _really_ annoying. Shooting him a hard glare, Ezri snaps, "No, you don't. It's not your business to see anything anymore." At Julian's raised eyebrows, she adds, "Maybe I do have a concussion..."

"You could ask someone else," Julian suggests. "Ferenginar isn't that far away, if you want Leeta to--"

"No, it has to be Kira." Swinging her legs and staring down at her shoes, Ezri cannot articulate why it's so important. Leeta is her friend, and she would be happy to do it, but it wouldn't be _right_. 

"It just has to be Kira," she mumbles.

 

*

 

Moping at Quark's is definitely the Jadzia in her.

It should make her feel closer to her, the way standing on her head makes her feel like Emony is right there with her, and how every time she steps into a runabout she wants to reach back through time and slap Torias over the head, but apparently it's not going to be that easy. Finishing her cocktail, she leans over the bar disk.

"Bloodwine," she demands of Quark, with as much Klingon in her voice as she can muster. 

(It's not all that much.)

"Didn't think you liked the stuff," Quark says, giving her a suspicious look. "You still have to pay for it, whether you finish it or not."

"Less talking, more drinking."

Quark rolls his eyes -- something he never used to do around Jadzia. "Whatever you say." Handing her the cup, he continues, "But don't go and blame me when you get all sour-faced and grumpy."

"I don't get sour-faced," Ezri says, and grimaces as she takes a sip. 

The bloodwine is terrible. She drinks it anyway, and then another one. If nothing else, the taste does have a decidedly Klingon effect on her disposition. 

Making her way to her quarters, she searches through the wardrobe until she finds Jadzia's bat'leth, shoved far into the back of it. Worf had given it to her -- taking it off the wall, where it had hung together with his own while they were married -- when he had left the station. Holding it in her hands, Ezri vividly remembers wielding it, but she also remembers her limbs being somewhat longer while doing it.

The first casualty is a blue vase that once belonged to Curzon, a gift from some woman or another -- between Jadzia, Curzon and Emony, it sometimes felt as if she'd bedded half the galaxy. Second, she rams the bat'leth into her bedside table, chopping it in two, along with three PADDs that fizzle, sparkle and finally power down and die.

Next, she drives the bat'leth into a painting -- one of her brother's, depicting a New Sydney landscape -- and into the wall, where it, unfortunately, embeds itself with some permanence.

Ezri staggers back, out of breath, and then, she runs.

 

*

 

It seems to take forever for Kira to open her door. When she finally does, she's wearing pink pyjamas and a distracted look on her face.

"You're not wearing shoes," Ezri blurts out, staring at the bare feet in front of her. It seems like a very important fact to note.

"I was... praying."

"Oh. I didn't realize you had to take your shoes off for that."

"I don't, that's not... I couldn't sleep."

"I had bloodwine."

"Yes," Kira says, crossing her arms. "I'm familiar with the smell of it."

"I broke my wall with a bat'leth."

"All right," she says, with a sigh, "come in."

Ezri has been in Kira's quarters before, but not at night. Not since she was someone else, anyway. Jadzia used to walk in like she owned the place, day and night, and Kira had grumbled but never seemed to mind all that much.

Lead by memories, Ezri stumbles through the living area, through the open door into the bedroom, and flops down on Kira's bed, face down.

After a moment, she feels the bed move as Kira sits down next to her.

"Why are you drinking bloodwine?"

"I'm Dax," Ezri mumbles into Kira's duvet. 

"It would seem so," Kira says, and Ezri can hear the smile in her voice.

"I was trying to feel closer to Jadzia, but I just ended up breaking stuff and now I feel sick."

Ezri keeps her eyes pressed closed against the duvet, as she feels Kira put her hand on her shoulder, fingers stroking the short hair at the nape of her neck. Ezri stays very, very still.

"Okay," Kira finally says, softly as she exhales.

Turning her head to the side, Ezri looks up at her. "What?"

"I'll be part of your zhian'tara." Kira's smile is somewhere between tender and resigned, and Ezri can't take her eyes off it. "I'll take care of Jadzia for you."


	2. Chapter 2

Emony Dax likes people.

Everyone has a story or two hundred, everyone has secrets, and Emony likes to think of herself as an explorer -- a connoisseur of minds and bodies. It comes from Dax, this yearning to learn about others, but not from Lela or Tobin. Rather, being joined brought something out of Emony herself, something deep and buried, that she hadn't expected. Trills have always kept to themselves, by tradition and natural inclination, but once Emony was joined, she suddenly found herself with an unquenchable urge to see the stars.

The woman next to her shifts slightly, and Emony takes the opportunity to slide a hand over her hip, pulling them closer together, back to front. Her body is warm, a delightful combination of soft and hard. There's a name at the tip of Emony's tongue, one she knows she'll remember once her mind has chased away the sleep and after-effects of the alcohol.

Emony puts her mouth on the woman's neck, breathing in the smell of her skin as she kisses under her ear. The woman exhales, shifting her hips, and word on her breath, something that must be a name. It sounds familiar enough that Emony wonders if perhaps they met the night before. The details are still a little fuzzy.

"I'm not _Odo_ ," Emony whispers back, "but if you want to invite whoever it is next time, I wouldn't mind."

The woman wakes up with a jolt and spins around in her arms, giving her an open-mouth stare. Seeing her face makes something inside Emony click with recognition and an unexpected rush of emotion. For a moment, she's lost in confusion, trying to figure out if her feelings belong to Tobin or Lela.

"Dax," the woman says, giving her a stern look, and Emony can just about taste her name on her lips, sweet and familiar; warm and aching in her chest.

"I think" she says, "considering the setting, you can call me Emony."

" _Ezri_."

And she goes absolutely rigid as she remembers the terrible, awful fact, that Emony has been dead for over a hundred years, and the one making inappropriate advances to Kira is none other than Ezri -- the one of Dax's hosts, possibly with the exception of Tobin, the least able to handle such a situation.

"Emony, you are no longer my favorite," Ezri mutters under her breath as she practically jumps out of Kira's bed.

She is still wearing most of her uniform, luckily, but for some reason her socks seem to be missing. A memory pops into her head of taking them off with the intention of doing some barefooted praying to whatever god-like aliens willing to listen. With a flash of embarrassment, she also remembers curling up under Kira's covers, as Kira firmly told her to sleep and not wake up until she was able to hold a conversation without bursting into giggles.

"I'm so, so, _so_ sorry!" she stutters as she locates a sock on the floor and sprints towards it. "I have a morning problem."

Kira sits up on the bed, watching her. "So this kind of thing happens to you a lot?"

"Only in the mornings," Ezri replies miserably. "It's not all bad. Audrid always makes the best breakfasts, and Tobin loves mornings, so he always gets me out of bed bright and early. Although between you and me, I think Curzon might have enjoyed surprising Julian a little too much. Did I mention I was sorry? I promise, next time--"

Kira gives her a tight-lipped smile. "Next time you get drunk on bloodwine, wreck your quarters with a bat'leth, knock on my door in the middle of the night and fall asleep on my bed?"

In Ezri's head, Curzon has the audacity to _laugh_. No wonder Jadzia didn't like him; he was not half as charming as he thought he was.

"I-have-to-go," Ezri mumbles, stumbling towards and out the door, catapulted by the speed of true humiliation. 

It was a feeling she had grown very used to since becoming a Dax.

 

*

 

The door chimes and Ezri sits up on the couch, for a second convinced it's going to be Kira.

Of course it's not Kira, who has no reason to come to Ezri's quarters, but Ezri still finds herself disappointed when the door opens and Julian is on the other side. "Oh, it's you," she says, walking back to the couch and flopping down on it.

Julian has a tricorder in his hand, and he waves it over her with some concern on his face. "I didn't think this needed to be spelled out, especially not to you," he says, "but head trauma and alcohol is not a particularly healthy combination."

"Am I dying? Because I could live with that. Or not, I guess."

"I think you'll pull through." Julian quirks an eyebrow in the direction of her feet. "You do seem to have misplaced a sock."

"It's lost forever," Ezri mumbles, because she's pretty sure Kira is going to instate some kind of 'no Daxes' rule on her quarters from now on.

"Well," Julian says, putting his tricorder away, "I recommend water and a change of clothes."

"Can't you just give me a hypospray with stuff that make me feel better?"

"I could, but I'm not going to."

"You're a terrible doctor."

"I'm actually an excellent doctor. I just don't believe the best treatment for questionable decisions is a medical one." He pauses, head tilting as his gaze falls on Jadzia's bat'leth, still embedded in the wall. "Interesting decorating choices."

"I don't go into your quarters and complain about your taste," Ezri mutters.

"Yes, you did. You psychoanalyzed my furniture."

On any other day, Ezri would explain just why that was totally different, but as it is, she settles on shooting him a glare that's probably more sulky than indignant. Seeing as how they'd both been naked at the time, she's pretty sure he hadn't minded her comments all that much. (Since they'd stopped being naked together Julian had become much less forgiving of them.)

"Now," Julian says, beaming like it's his birthday, "don't forget what day it is."

"Huh?"

"The O'Briens! I've had the holosuite reservations ready for a month."

"No, that's tomorrow. They're set to get here right before the Guardian comes."

"Yesterday it was tomorrow. And then you gave yourself head trauma, drank too much and redecorated. Today it's _today_."

Today is the worst of days, of that Ezri is sure.

 

*

 

The O'Briens arrive later that day, loudly.

A flurry of children (still only two, but giving the impression of so many more), a wailing cat, Julian and Miles experiencing a hallowed reunion, and Kira crouching in front of little Kirayoshi with an excited smile and a gift-wrapped packet in her hands.

Keiko heads straight for Ezri, giving her a quick hug and then looking at her with a determined look on her face. "When do we start? I can't wait!"

"Soon," Ezri replies, and swallows down a wave of nausea at the thought of it. "You should make yourselves comfortable in the meantime. I've got some important things to take care of before the Guardian gets here."

Those important things are, predominantly, space-sickness, panic attacks and an unquenchable urge to put a blanket over her head and pretend she does not exist. Leaving the O'Briens in Julian and Kira's capable hands, Ezri listens to her instincts and escapes.

The Bajoran Temple is empty at this time of day. A Vedek pokes his head into the room when she bursts in, but as he recognizes her, he leaves her alone. It's not the first time she's run into the Temple, and maybe the Vedeks understand her need to return to the place of her last death. As much as anyone who was not a joined Trill could understand, anyway.

It's funny how thinking about dying can be such a relief.

Torias, Joran and Jadzia all had such quick, unexpected deaths, maybe that's why she remembers them so much more vividly than the others. Torias's crash was quick and panicked, and she'll never be able to pilot a ship without thinking about it. Joran's last memory is of seething rage and disappointment; feeling the sedation kicking in before the surgery that would take the symbiont from him. And Jadzia... of all the memories she has of Jadzia, this one is the clearest. The Temple, the orb, and Gul Dukat. 

_Not here, not now, not here_.

Sliding down to sit on the floor in the darkest corner of the room, Ezri stares at the orb on the other side of the Temple. 

Eventually, Kira finds her. 

"I'm hiding," Ezri says, hugging her knees and looking up.

"That much is obvious," Kira replies. Her voice is stern, but she crouches and sits down next to Ezri, leaning back against the wall. "Jadzia was afraid too."

"It was different for her. She was so scared of not being good enough. I already know I'm not, and I don't care. All I want is..."

"What?"

"I don't know."

"Maybe that's the problem."

Ezri glances at Kira; the familiar profile of her face, the slope of her Bajoran nose that always stirs something inside of her, and her thoughts drift back to Jadzia.


	3. Chapter 3

"You'll learn," Lela says, and Kasidy's eyes are equal measures warmth and steel.

"Worrying never gets you anywhere good," Tobin says, with all of Nog's empathy on his face. "Take it from me."

Audrid-in-Keiko puts Kirayoshi in her arms and wraps them both up in a hug, whispering in her ear, "Regret is an ugly thing. Remember what's important."

"It'll be the best journey you'll ever take," Emony promises, a far away look on Julian's face. "The most exciting of all adventures."

Torias's grin on Jake's face is somewhat eerie. "Having a head full of women kind of helped with the ladies, actually. Don't give me that look, I'm just saying having the experience of more than one perspective gives you a different outlook on things."

Morn agrees, like Ben the time before, to do the ceremony in a holding cell, but it turns out to be unnecessary. Joran simply glares at her through Morn's eyes, not saying a word. Apparently he's still huffy from the last time they met.

"Don't think so much," Curzon says, slapping Quark's hand on her back so hard she almost falls over. "As I'm sure this host you put me in would be the first to say: that's what bloodwine is for!"

And then, once Curzon has said goodbye -- it's too soon, she's not ready yet, but suddenly Curzon is back in her head and it's Quark who's standing in front of her -- it's time for Jadzia.

"Excuse me for a minute," Ezri tells the guardian, and then she goes to the bathroom to throw up.

 

*

 

Kira is uncharacteristically pale, but at least she doesn't look like she's about to lose her lunch. Ezri is pretty sure she can't say the same, never mind that her lunch has already made a reappearance and her stomach is distressingly empty.

"I'm ready," Kira says, taking a breath and closing her eyes for a moment. It smooths some of the tension from her face, and Ezri wishes she too had a Prophet or two that could do the same for her.

Saying that she's ready would be a boldfaced lie, so Ezri just nods at the guardian.

The ceremony itself seems too short for something so substantial; the Guardian speaks a few words, and then Jadzia is gone, removed from her mind and, just as with the others, Ezri experiences an overwhelming sense of emptiness. 

At least until she looks up and sees the part of her that's missing standing in front of her. 

Kira is the one who's gone, suppressed and pliant under another consciousness. The person looking back at her, through Kira's dark eyes, is Jadzia.

Ezri swallows, willing away all thoughts of nausea.

"Dax," Jadzia says, and there is a resignation in her voice that pierces straight through Ezri's heart. The woman in front of her is Jadzia, but in this moment, she is no longer Dax, and for the first time, Ezri thinks about the host that will carry Dax when she is dead, and the next Zhian'tara she will take part in. 

"Oh, don't give me that look," Jadzia says. "After all, I'm the one who's dead, not you."

A strange look passes over Kira's face, then, and Ezri can see the exact moment Jadzia realizes whose body she's inhabiting. Looking down and holding Kira's hands out for her to see, Jadzia exhales.

Walking over to the mirror on the wall, Jadzia touches her face with something that looks almost like reverence.

"I'm still on DS9," Ezri says. "I mean, of course you can see that, you know how this place looks... I'm a counselor! Though I've been taking some shifts at Ops recently, I blame that on you and Tobin."

Jadzia doesn't answer, so Ezri continues, not because she thinks Jadzia is listening but because she can't seem to get her mouth to stop. "Worf isn't on the Station anymore. Sisko is... gone. It's kind of a long story."

Jadzia turns around, a soft smile growing on her face. "How about we go say hi to Quark?"

Ezri can't think of anything wrong with that.

 

*

 

When Ezri was a child, she loved to spin in circles, around and around, until the whole world swam like an ocean and she was floating on the waves. Unfortunately, such games often ended rather abruptly with Ezri running head first into things like tables, chairs, or walls.

While tending to her bruises, her mother would sometimes say, "I suppose it's a good thing you've inherited your father's thick skull, if you insist on using the outside of your head instead of the inside."

(Loving every comparison made to her father, she hadn't understood, then, that it was meant as an insult to them both.)

She would grow out of games that involved spinning around, but since being joined to Dax, her limbs had seemed to grow a life of their own -- or rather, _eight_ new lives. Not that it made people wince any less if she blamed Dax when she tripped, fumbled and dropped things, or almost fell down turbolift shafts.

Point is, Ezri is sure she has a pretty sturdy head, one that is used to the occasional close encounter with foreign objects, but after the past few days, she is starting to wonder if she should be concerned about brain injuries. 

The first part of the evening goes pretty well. While Jadzia catches up with Quark, Ezri gulps down bloodwine, which tastes even worse without Jadzia in her head. 

Even Jadzia grimaces slightly when she takes the first sip. "Apparently Kira's taste buds don't approve," she says, not that it stops her from taking another sip straight away.

"I've noticed that the Major seems to prefer springwine," Quark says. "I'd be more than happy to provide you with some."

"I think I'll stick with what I've got. After all, this is a special occasion. How about a toast? To death."

"Now that's a word that has a different meaning to you Trill people."

Sometimes, the best decisions involve drinking, so Ezri does that, while Jadzia and Quark quickly seem to forget she's even there. The bloodwine seems to bring a lot of boisterous, melodramatic Klingon memories to the foreground, ones belonging to Curzon, and so when a fellow of undetermined alien origin makes a show of threatening a Bolian next to her, Ezri stands up and shoves him away.

"Hey!" she says, feeling tall and strong with Curzon flowing in her veins. "How about you pick on somebody your own size?"

"Like you?"

The punch comes from nowhere, hitting her square in the jaw, and then she is on the floor.

It is definitely a good thing that she has a head well-proven to be sturdy.

Jadzia crouches over her just as someone above calls out, " _Bar fight!_ ", and then all hell breaks loose around them.

Jadzia stares at her, fingers grabbing her chin. "Ezri?" she asks, and Ezri realizes it's not Jadzia at all anymore. It's such a tangible shift it's impossible to ignore, even after too many drinks and a punch in the face.

"Kira," Ezri mouths, and it's really her again. It's Kira and she's Ezri, and Jadzia is nowhere to be seen. "You know, I really like your face."

"I think you hit your head."

"Yes, I did," Ezri confirms, smiling happily at Kira's face.

Sitting up, somewhat unsteadily, she finds herself faced with an expression that most definitely belongs to a Dax. Kira's gone, again, and the person looking back at her is Jadzia. "Hello again," Ezri says.

"You're not very good at these things, are you?"

"Drinking or participating in bar fights?"

Jadzia pats her back. "Let's let that remain unsaid."

 

*

 

Departing from Quark's before Security swoops in and they risk spending the rest of the zhian'tara in a holding cell, they go home. Jadzia studies every part of Ezri's quarters, and Ezri suddenly understands what Julian meant when he told her to stop analyzing his decorating style.

At least she smirks at the bat'leth in the wall, before pulling it out without breaking a sweat, because apparently everyone has more upper body strength than Ezri does.

Looking down at the weapon cradled in her arms, Jadzia traces the blade with her fingers. "A part of me always thought being joined made me immortal," she says. "Even if I died, I'd live on as long as Dax did. It's not quite the same, though, is it?"

Ezri doesn't quite know how to answer that.

"I thought I had all the time in the world," Jadzia says, something wistful crossing Kira's face. "And then it was all over, and I didn't have a chance to do half the things I wanted to do, or say half the things I wanted to say."

Silently, Ezri watches as Jadzia reverently puts the bat'leth down on the table and steps up close, putting her fingers on Ezri's jaw. "I always wanted to do this," she says, and then she leans forward to press Kira's soft lips on Ezri's.

It's painfully true that Jadzia isn't talking about Ezri. In fact, she feels mostly like a voyeur, pulled along out of necessity but not really invited to the party. Dax and Kira, the way it was and should have been, while Ezri was still Ezri Tigan and Jadzia Dax had the rest of her life stretched out in front of her.

Kira might be lending her body to Jadzia, but Ezri feels like she's loaning her lips to both Kira and Jadzia. letting them share a kiss that never was. It's so easy to fall into it, into the memory of a memory of being Jadzia. Even though those memories are no longer inside of her, Ezri remembers, and more than that, she remembers the face that Kira would sometimes get, when she was looking at Ezri and seeing someone else.

Without the presence of Jadzia's memories in her head, something that belongs to Ezri alone fills the empty space left behind, and all she wants to do is hold on and never let go. Intimacy never used to be so complicated, but being joined threw a curveball straight into her libido. She used to know what she liked and what she didn't, but suddenly she had eight extra sets of sexual preferences in her head. 

Breaking away from Jadzia, Ezri tries to gather her thoughts. "Can I," she starts, swallowing to steady her voice, "can I talk to Kira?"

Ezri presses her eyes closed, until she feels a hand cup her face, thumb caressing her cheek. Jadzia's soft, longing expression is gone; only Kira is left, and there is something so devastatingly sad in her face that Ezri forgets how to breathe. 

"Do you want to call the Guardian?" Kira asks.

"No," Ezri replies. "Do you?"

Kira shakes her head slowly. "No. But this is your zhian'tara."

Ezri leans forward, capturing Kira's mouth in another kiss, letting that be her answer. It's Jadzia who kisses her back, with Kira's mouth, and it's Jadzia who touches her neck, with Kira's hand. It's been so hard to know where Ezri ends and the others start; it's been so hard to tell Jadzia's feelings from her own. 

It's Jadzia who pushes her down on the bed, crawling on top of her, but when Ezri looks up, all she sees is Kira. There is something indescribably beautiful about the way she strips off layers of clothes, slowly, as if Jadzia is savoring every newly uncovered part of Kira's skin, until she's entirely naked. 

Knees on either side of Ezri's thighs, Jadzia sits back and runs her hands over Kira's torso, over round breasts, over the faint outline of her ribs, and down over the softness of her belly. Hands returning up and settling over pink nipples, Jadzia leans her head back with a sigh. One hand travels down to her hip, pausing, and then lower, between her legs. Ezri's cheeks burn, as her breath hitches, and she's never felt more like an intruder on something that doesn't belong to her. 

A sound crosses Kira's lips -- a moan, and Ezri doesn't know if it belongs to Jadzia or Kira. The uncertainty only burns that much hotter, and Ezri lets her own hand dart downwards. The pressure is dull through her pants; groin throbbing, back arching, she can't take her eyes off Kira. 

"Well, aren't you eager," Jadzia says, startling Ezri into freezing on the spot, hand between her thighs.

The smile on Kira's face is all Jadzia, and Ezri is glad she's still wearing clothes, because she's pretty sure she's experiencing a full-body blush. "You seemed to be busy," she finally chokes out.

And then Jadzia is on top of her, mouth on hers, tongue teasing along with her hands. After watching those hands -- Kira's hands, Jadzia's hands -- touch Kira's body, it is irresistibly intense. There's a naked thigh between her legs, and hands finding their way under her shirt. 

"Kira," Ezri mumbles, but it doesn't feel right. "Jadzia," she says instead, but it's not much better. None of the sessions with the Symbiosis Commission after she was joined covered this particular area, and she finds herself trying to sort out the correct use of language as she pushes her hips _up_.

"Being joined never stops being interesting," Jadzia remarks, breath hot against Ezri's ear, "I can't wait for next time."

It makes Ezri wonder if Jadzia is concocting some sort of plan to bed all future Dax hosts during their zhian'tara -- the future Dax hosts who will all remember this moment, and every other questionable decision Ezri is sure she's going to make. She's never before thought much about the Daxes who will come after her, too busy being bombarded with emotions and impressions from the past. One day, there might be a newly joined young Trill, blushing at the memory of Ezri Dax and Jadzia Dax.

(It actually makes her feel a little bit better about her reaction to some of Curzon's memories.)

Jadzia slides her hand down Ezri's pants, and for a little while, Ezri stops thinking about both the future and the past, and pretty much everything else that doesn't involve Kira's hands and mouth, and the bare breasts that are cushioned against her own. Helpless in the barrage of physical sensation and the sharp, pulsing pleasure of Kira's hands, she stops holding onto who Ezri is, and oh, letting go and drowning in the sea of voices in her head is the greatest relief.

Flushed and slick, she comes down from her high, relaxed and limber against the sheets. Above her, Jadzia is slightly out of breath as she smirks with Kira's lovely, beautiful mouth.

Something that feels like Curzon and Audrid rises in her, something possessive, as she rolls Jadzia over, pushing her down with her weight. Cradled between Kira's thighs, wet with her arousal, Ezri puts her mouth on Kira, until Jadzia writhes under her, hips straining against her.

Emony did it to a great many ladies across the universe, and Curzon had his fair share of experience, but more than anything Ezri remembers Torias doing this with Nilani. With her mouth and tongue, she draws out sounds that belong to Kira and Jadzia both; Kira's voice and Jadzia's words, she can't tell where one stops and the other starts, and maybe it's better that way.

Jadzia loved so many people, and she loved with an intensity that Ezri doesn't know what to do with. But Jadzia is not in her head right now.

She's a stupid Trill, the stupidest of them all. Just like every Dax has lead with their heart and gone where they shouldn't, that same stupid impulse has brought Ezri here, with her head between Kira's thighs, and without Jadzia in her head, there's no more room to blame someone else or deny that her wants are her own.

" _Yes_ ," Jadzia says, arching her back, and the word reverberates through Kira's skin and all the way through Ezri. 

_I want_ , Ezri thinks, and she doesn't finish the sentence.

 

*

 

Quark's face actually lights up as Ezri sits down at the bar, which is probably a sign she's been spending far too much time there. "Bloodwine?" he offers, reaching under the disk to retrieve a bottle of the stuff. 

"I think I've had enough of that for a while," Ezri replies, and can't help a stitch of guilt as Quark's face falls. Knowing him, he'd probably started to stock up.

Putting the bottle away, Quark remarks, somewhat sullenly, "So the zhian'tara helped with that particular personality crisis."

"To be honest, I think when you're a joined Trill, personality crises are more like a way of life than something you really get over."

Behind her back, Kira clears her throat, and Ezri spins around on her chair to find Kira stepping closer, hands clasped behind her back. Tongue-tied, Ezri fails entirely at saying hello.

"Speaking of bloodwine," Quark says in her stead, "it's a pleasure to see you, Colonel. Looking to clear out my shelves again?"

"That was Jadzia."

"Yes, I liked you better when she was in your head. Springwine, then? Andorian ale? Aldebaran whiskey? Saurian brandy?"

"Seeing as how it's barely lunch time--"

"I don't judge."

"--how about some kava juice for the both of us?"

Kira sits down. 

Her hands end up clasped on the bar disk, and Ezri can't seem to stop her cheeks from burning at the sight of them. It's strange to think about it now, and remember it from two perspectives: Ezri touching Kira, and Jadzia touching Ezri. 

She stares at her own hands instead, as Quark brings them their kava juice. 

"I got a subspace message from the Symbiosis Commission," she says. "They wanted to make sure my zhian'tara had been a good experience. I'm thinking of sending them Quark's bill for the liquor."

"Was it a good experience?" Kira asks, and Ezri glances up, cheeks burning as she meets her eyes.

"It was... interesting."

"At first," Kira says, looking down, "I wished you hadn't asked me."

"I know," Ezri mumbles. There's an apology on her lips, but it stays put. In truth, it would be a lie. Some wounds are better left undisturbed, Ezri understands that, but she'd still make the same decision again.

"But I wanted you to know that I'm glad you did. I didn't want to face Jadzia again, but... maybe I needed to."

Kira exhales, eyes still locked on her hands, and the loss is plain to see on her face. Maybe she will always look at Ezri and see two people, just like Benjamin sees three. There's a reason most joined Trill stay away from people from their previous lives, but somehow Dax just can't seem to let go. 

Kira clasps Ezri's hand, tightly, and Ezri... 

Ezri is a Dax, and Daxes hold on.


End file.
